Slaves of Obsession (5 page)

Alberton drew in his breath.

“Yes,” Casbolt said without hesitation. “Certainly. Forgive me, but it was to form some judgment of your willingness to pursue a difficult and even dangerous case to the conclusion, to fight for justice when all seemed stacked against you, that I asked you so much about yourself earlier in the evening, before you knew the reason why. I also wished to see if you had the vision to see a cause greater than satisfying the letter of the law.”

Monk smiled a trifle twistedly. He also took few men at their word.

“Now, if you would tell me how they got in touch with you, and everything you know about Alexander Gilmer, both his life and his death,” he replied, “I will begin tomorrow morning. If they get in touch with you again, delay them. Tell them you need to make arrangements and are in the process of doing so.”

“Thank you.” For the first time since he had mentioned the subject, Alberton relaxed a little. “I am deeply obliged. Now we must discuss the financial arrangements.”

Casbolt reached out his hand. “Thank you, Monk. I think we now have room to hope.”

2

M
ONK HAD DESCRIBED
the case to Hester on their way home from the Albertons’ house. She was entirely at one with him about his acceptance. She found blackmail as abhorrent as he did, and apart from that, she had liked Judith Alberton and was distressed to think of the amount of embarrassment and pain that might be caused to the family were scandal to be created over the circumstances of Alberton’s help to Alexander Gilmer.

Monk set out early to go to Little Sutton Street in Clerkenwell, where Alberton had told him Gilmer had died. It was only eight o’clock as he walked rapidly towards Tottenham Court Road to find a hansom, but the streets were full of all kinds of traffic: cabs, carts, wagons, drays, coster-mongers’ barrows, peddlers selling everything from matches and bootlaces to ham sandwiches and lemonade. A running patterer stood on the corner with a small crowd around him while he chanted a rough doggerel verse about the latest political scandal and caused roars of laughter. Someone threw him a coin and it flashed for a moment in the sun before he caught it.

The musical call of a rag and bone man sounded above the noise of hooves and the rumble of wheels over the rough road. Harness clinked as a brewer’s dray went by laden with giant barrels. The air was heavy with the smells of dust, horse sweat and manure.

Monk glanced at a newsboy’s headlines, but there was
nothing about America. The last he had heard was the rumor that the real invasion of the Confederate states was not to take place until the autumn of this year. Back in mid-April President Lincoln had proclaimed a naval blockade of the Confederate coast right from South Carolina to Texas, then later extended it to include Virginia and North Carolina. Fortifications had been begun to protect Washington.

Today was Tuesday the twenty-fifth of June. If anything had happened since then more than the occasional skirmish, news of it had not yet reached England. That took roughly from twelve days to three weeks, depending upon the weather and how far it had to travel overland first.

He saw an empty hansom and waved his arm, shouting above the general noise. When the driver pulled the horse up Monk gave him the address of the Clerkenwell police station. He had already considered how he intended to begin. He did not suppose either Alberton or Casbolt was lying to him, although clients certainly had in the past and no doubt would again. But even the best-intentioned people frequently make mistakes, omit important facts, or simply see an incomplete picture and interpret it through their own hopes and fears.

The cab arrived at the police station; Monk alighted, paid the fare and went in. Even five years after the accident, and with so much of a new life built, he still felt a surge of anxiety, the unknown returning to remind him of those things he had discovered about himself. Right from the beginning he had had flashes of familiarity, moments of recollection which vanished before he could place them. Most of what he knew was from evidence and deduction. He had left his native Northumberland for London, and begun his career as a merchant banker, working for a man who had been his friend and mentor, until his ruin for a crime of which he was innocent, although Monk had been unable to help him prove it. That had been the force which had driven Monk into the police and away from the world of finance.

Too many discoveries had made it evident that he had
been a brilliant policeman, but with a ruthless streak, even cruel at times. Juniors had been afraid of his tongue, which had been too quick to criticize, to mock the weaker and the less confident. It was something he disliked, and of which he could at last admit, even if only to himself, he was ashamed. A quick temper was one thing, to demand high standards of courage and honesty was good, but to ask of a man more than his ability to give was not only pointless, it was cruel, and in the end destructive.

Every time he went into an unfamiliar police station, he was aware of the possibility that he would meet another reflection of himself he would not like. He dreaded recognition. But he refused to let it shackle him. He went in through the door and up to the desk.

The sergeant was a tall man, middle-aged, with thin hair. There was no expression in his face but polite interest.

Monk breathed a sigh of relief.

“Mornin’, sir,” the sergeant said pleasantly. “What can I do to help you?”

“Good morning,” Monk replied. “I need some information about an incident that happened in your area some months ago. A friend of mine is threatened with involvement in a scandal. Before I undertake to protect him, if I can, I should like to be certain of the facts. All I am looking for is what is recorded.” He smiled. “But from an unimpeachable source.”

The sergeant’s polite skepticism was replaced by a certain understanding.

“I see, sir. And which particular incident would that be?” A look crossed his eyes as if he might already have a good idea, at least of its nature, if not specifically which occasion.

Monk smiled apologetically. “The death of Alexander Gilmer in Little Sutton Street. I am sure you will have records of it and someone who knows the truth.” It was at times like these he missed the authority he used to have when he could simply have demanded the papers.

“Well, sir, the records are here, sure enough, but they
won’t be open to the public, like. I’m sure you’ll understand that, Mr.…?”

“I’m sorry. Monk, William Monk.”

“Monk?” Interest flared in the sergeant’s eyes. “Would you be the Mr. Monk as worked on the Carlyon case?”

Monk was startled. “Yes. That was a few years ago now.”

“Terrible thing,” the sergeant said gravely. “Well, I s’pect since you used to be one of us, like, we could tell you all we know. I’ll find Sergeant Walters as was on the case.” And he disappeared for several minutes, leaving Monk to look around at the various wanted posters on the walls, relieved that the sergeant knew of him only since the accident.

Sergeant Walters was a thin, dark man with an enthusiastic manner. He took Monk to a small, chaotic room with books and papers piled everywhere, and cleared a chair by lifting everything off it and putting it all on the floor. He invited Monk to sit down, then perched on the windowsill, the only other space available.

“Right!” he said with a smile. “What do you wanter know about Gilmer, poor devil?”

“Everything you know,” Monk said. “Or as much as you have time and inclination to tell me.”

“Ah! Well.” Walters settled himself more comfortably. It seemed he often sat on the sill. This was apparently the normal state of the room. How he found anything was a miracle.

Monk leaned back hopefully.

Walters stared at the ceiling. “About twenty-nine when he died. Tubercular. Thin. Haunted sort of look to his face, but good features. Not surprised artists wanted to paint him. That’s what he did, you know? Yes, I suppose you do know.” He seemed to be waiting for confirmation.

Monk nodded. “I was told that.”

“Only saw him when he was dead,” Walters went on. He spoke quite casually, but his eyes never left Monk’s face, and Monk formed the very clear impression that he was being measured and nothing about him taken for granted. He
could imagine Walters writing notes on him the moment he was gone, and adding them to the file on Gilmer, and that Walters would know exactly where in this chaos the file was.

Monk already knew the name of the artist from Casbolt, but he did not say so.

“Fellow called FitzAlan,” Walters went on when Monk did not speak. “Quite famous. Found Gilmer in Edinburgh, or somewhere up that way. Brought him down here and took him in. Paid him a lot. Then grew tired of him, for whatever reason, and threw him out.” He waited to see Monk’s reaction to this piece of information.

Monk said nothing, keeping his expression bland.

Walters understood, and smiled. It was a measuring of wits, of professionalism, and now they both acknowledged it.

“He drifted from one artist to another,” Walters said with a little shake of his head. “Downhill all the time. Be all right for a while, then he seemed to quarrel and get thrown out again. Could’ve left of his own choice, of course, but since he had nowhere to go, and his health was getting worse, seems unlikely.”

Monk tried to imagine the young man, alone, far from home and increasingly ill. Why would he keep provoking such disagreements? He could not afford it, and he must have known that. Was he a man of ungoverned temper? Had he become an unusable model, the ravages of his disease spoiling his looks? Or were the relationships those of lovers, or by then simply user and used, and when the user grew bored the used was discarded for someone else? It was a sad and ugly picture, whichever of these answers was true.

“How did he die?” he asked.

Walters watched him very steadily, his eyes almost unblinking. “Doctor said it was consumption,” he replied. “But he’d been knocked around pretty badly as well. Not exactly murder, not technically, but morally I reckon it was. I’d find a way to beat the daylights out of any man who treated a dog like that man’d been used. I don’t care what he did to get by or what his nature was.” Under the calm of his manner there
was an anger so hot he dared not let it go, but Monk saw it behind his eyes, and in the rigid set of his shoulders and in his arms where the fingers were stiff on the windowsill, knuckles white.

He had found Walters instantly agreeable. Now he liked him the more.

“Did you ever get anybody for it?” he asked, although he knew the answer.

“No. But I haven’t stopped looking,” Walters replied. “If you find anybody in your … help for your friend … I’d be obliged.” He looked at Monk curiously now, trying to assess where his loyalties lay and exactly what sort of “friend” he had.

Monk himself was not sure. The blackmail letter Alberton had shown him was comparatively innocuous. It was awkwardly worded, made up from pieces cut from newspapers and pasted onto a sheet of very ordinary paper one might buy at any stationer’s. It had stated that the payments could be interpreted as purchase of several forms, and in light of the way in which Gilmer had died, public knowledge of it would ruin Alberton’s standing in society. No suggestion had been made that either Alberton or Casbolt was responsible for Gilmer’s death. Possibly the blackmailer was afraid they could prove themselves elsewhere at the time. More likely such a threat was unnecessary. He thought he could obtain what he wanted without going so far.

“If I find out,” Monk promised, “I shall be happy to assist you to dispense justice. I gather it was a male brothel where he was found?”

“That’s right,” Walters agreed. “And before you ask me what he was doing there, I’ll tell you that I don’t know. The owner said he took pity on him and fetched him in off the streets, an act of charity.” There was no irony in his eyes, and his look dared Monk to differ. “Could be true. Gilmer, poor devil, was in little state to be any use as a worker, and he had neither strength nor money to be a client, assuming he was that way inclined, which no one seems to know.
We’ve just got it down officially as death by natural causes. But we all know damned well that someone beat him pretty badly too. Could have had them for assault if the poor sod hadn’t died anyway.”